


Headcase

by synchronik



Series: Not The Prettiest Game [11]
Category: Baseball RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-28
Updated: 2015-12-28
Packaged: 2018-05-10 00:04:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,681
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5561068
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/synchronik/pseuds/synchronik
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Here's the problem: Gerrit Cole is a headcase.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Headcase

Here's the problem: Gerrit Cole is a headcase.

He's a great pitcher, with great stuff, and when it's all working he's one of the best in the game, but when it's not working he melts down like a three-year-old having a tantrum in the middle of the cereal aisle. 

And tonight, the night of the 2015 Wild Card, it's not working.

Cole's been overthrowing from the first pitch, releasing too early so his pitches rise up in the zone. Chris considers saying something after the first inning, but there's no need. Searage already knows, which means Cervelli already knows, which means Cole already knows. Telling him again helps no one. The problem is that Cole can't fix it.

In the playoffs, the backup catcher becomes background. It's a fact of the job, and Chris doesn't mind. He goes out to the dugout for the start of the game anyway, to support his teammates and to soak up the energy of the crowd. It's amazing hearing them roar, even if they don't roar for him, even if he doesn't see the field for the next month. Last year, it had been bittersweet because of the team across the field, but this time, there are no mixed feelings: the Cubs need their playoff dreams crushed immediately and totally.

Except it goes wrong from the start. This time there isn't a grand slam that blows up a tie game. It's just a hit here and a steal there, a couple of ground balls that bounce funny, a throw that goes astray, a pitch left out over the zone, and then they're down 4-0, just like they were last year. Same shit, different day.

Chris is in the clubhouse when Cole gets yanked. He's dressed for the game, because you never know what could happen, but he's starting to think seriously about packing his bag when Cole comes storming in, whipping his glove across the room into the back of someone's locker. It doesn't quite hit 97 miles an hour, but it's close.

"Hey, man," Chris says.

"Fuck," Cole says. "This is fucking bullshit."

Chris nods. It's not bullshit, is the thing. It sucks, definitely, and Chris can only imagine how much more it sucks when you're the guy primarily responsible for the sucking, but it's not bullshit. The Cubs are beating them, fair and square, and the only reason Cole thinks it's bullshit is because Cole is a headcase who hasn't quite internalized the fact that on any given day you can lose. 

"I mean, right, Stew? A one game playoff. That's bullshit. We're better than them!"

It's all Chris can do to refrain from looking at the television silently broadcasting the fact that, on this particular night, the Pirates are absolutely not better than the Cubs.

"This is shit," Cole mutters, more to himself than Chris now. He's wandering around in little circles like a distressed dog, yanking his hat off his head and twisting it in his hands before putting it back on. 

Chris sighs. Fucking psycho pitchers.

"Hey," he says. "You should get back out there."

Cole lifts his eyes. "What?"

"You should get back out there. By the bottom of the inning."

"Fuck that," Cole says. "I'm done. It's over."

Chris stands up and walks over to Cole. Cole is almost as tall as Chris, and has a good fifteen pounds on him, and he's upset, but he's also a young pitcher, raised and trained to defer to the authority of the catcher, especially his own personal catcher. Chris pokes him in the chest.

"This game isn't fucking over," he says, keeping his voice mild. "And it isn't about you. So get your ass back out there."

"What about you?" Cole says, in a tone reserved for a tattling little brother. "You're not out there."

"I'm not the goddamn starting pitcher," Chris says, and this time it's a struggle to keep his voice mild. Cole isn't stupid, but he's sure as fuck acting like it right now. "I'm not the one the cameras are going to be looking for."

Cole blanches a little at that, but his head's bobbing in the same way it does when Chris has to come out to the mound and tell him to lay off the fucking slider already, the way that means he doesn't like it, but he'll do it. "I have to pee," he says, and ducks around Chris's finger to head in the direction of the bathrooms.

Chris sits down again, and opens up his book (an account of the sinking of the Lusitania) because after that speech he can't very well be caught packing his bag, and listens for the flush. It takes too long, and by the time Cole's finished washing his hands, there's already an out in the bottom of the sixth, but he goes back up the hall to the dugout, waving an apologetic hand to Chris as he passes.

Chris waits until he's sure Cole is gone before he sighs. Fucking pitchers.

* * *

They lose. It's a little easier this time than it was last time, and that makes Chris nervous, but he goes through the motions anyway, the bro hugs, the bittersweet banter, the laughter that doesn't cover up the engulfing silence of loss. He walks past the visitor's clubhouse, barely registering the country music that blares behind the heavy metal doors.

Outside the park, the crowd has dissipated quickly. There are still some drunken clumps of fans clutching each other and waving dispirited Jolly Rogers, but he hardly has to pause for pedestrians before pulling out of the player's lot. He can see his condo across the river from the ballpark--Ryan joked once that if they didn't live on a cliff he could walk home--and he can tell that the kitchen light is on, like a lighthouse beacon leading him safely ashore.

* * *

When he gets there, bumping open the garage door with his knee, dinner is on the table. A pasta thing, and salad. The only dinner Ryan knows how to cook. 

And Ryan is there, too, getting up from the couch in the living room where he's watching some nature documentary with the lights off. In the glare from the television, Chris can see that he is wearing a Henley in fluorescent orange, a truly hideous shirt that highlights Ryan's powerful shoulders and thick arms.

He comes into the kitchen and opens the refrigerator, pulling out a beer and twisting off the cap before handing it to Chris. He opens one for himself and leans back against the counter. "To 2015," he says, holding out the bottle.

"2015," Chris says, clinking his bottle against Ryan's. "May it rot in hell."

Ryan smiles and takes a sip. "I made dinner."

"I see that."

"C'mon." Ryan puts an arm around him, stroking his back and guiding him toward the table at the same time. "Let's eat."

Afterwards, Chris goes to take a shower. When he comes out, damp and wearing a white t-shirt that Ryan has stretched through the shoulders, Ryan is watching The Shawshank Redemption on cable. Chris laughs.

"How many times are you going to watch this fucking thing?" he asks, sitting down under the arc of Ryan's arm that's propped up on the back of the couch. 

"As many times as it's on," Ryan says, squeezing his shoulder. 

"I'm just saying there's a whole world of movies that you haven't seen and don't know by heart." 

"Shut it," Ryan says.

Chris leans into him and closes his eyes, listening to the dulcet tones of Morgan Freeman talking about prison rape like it's a picnic in the park.

"You wanna talk about it?" Ryan asks.

"No." Chris shakes his head. He can feel water gathering around the edges of his eyes, like it does when he yawns really big, but he pretends that's nothing but weariness. "There's not much to say."

"Alright." Ryan rubs his shoulder again. "But if you want to..."

"Sure," Chris says, turning his face to Ryan's shoulder. He waits maybe a minute before he opens his mouth again. "He didn't want to watch the end of the inning."

"Really," Ryan says, neutral.

"He gets pulled and he wants to sit in the fucking clubhouse like a fucking baby." Chris sits up. He can feel himself getting angry.

"Not cool," Ryan says. He's turned toward Chris, but he's still got one eye on the television.

"Not fucking cool? It's a fucking joke is what it is! No wonder we can't win shit if this guy is supposed to be the ace of the team. He's a fucking headcase cry baby! He can't even sit in the dugout and face his fucking mistakes? Fuck that! Fuck that!"

He's shouting by the end, his face hot, fist slamming on the cushion in front of him. When he's finished, panting and trembling, Ryan is looking at him, one side of his face illuminated by the flickering of a car commercial.

"Sorry," Chris says, wiping his hands over his face. "Sorry. I'm just...whatever. He didn't want to go back out there."

"Yeah," Ryan says. "Well."

Chris laughs a little. He's embarrassed by his outburst, by his anger at Cole, by his sadness over the loss. "Yeah."

Ryan hooks one hand around the back of Chris's neck and pulls him in for a kiss. Not a sexy kiss, just a kiss, the brief contact that says "you're okay," the way a pat on the shoulder does in the dugout. "Pitchers, man," he says while his mouth is still close enough that Chris feels the words as much as he hears them. "They're all fucking psychos."  


Chris's chuckle is watery and thick with emotion. "I think I heard that somewhere."

Ryan pulls him close, slumping until he's sprawled on the couch, his feet on the end table, and Chris's cheek on his chest. Chris lies there and watches the movie, listening to the soft murmur of Ryan saying the lines along with the actors, and, underneath that, the heavy solid thump of his steady heart.


End file.
